New Feminists Club Fights Sexism at Yeshiva University

By New Voices Staff February 27, 2017

In all caps, the posters read, “SEXISM EXISTS,” on the wall outside the Yeshiva University library. Printouts of anonymous sexist social media posts by YU students surrounded the bolded statement. The display, torn down an hour after it went up on Feb. 16, was one of the first acts of the YU Feminists Club, a…

Read More...

Are You an #AppallingYoungJew?

By Sara Weissman February 23, 2017

This week, social media users witnessed a beautiful onslaught of snark and defiance from the Jewish millennial corner of the Twitterverse. Young Jews took to Twitter appalled by a swiftly deleted tweet suggesting that Israeli Knesset member Michael Oren had called their views on Israel appalling. “The opinions of young #american #jews are appalling. They need the…

Read More...

The Middle Ground on Israel Went Missing

By Charles Dunst February 23, 2017

The American political sphere is more polarized than ever – and the discourse around Israel is no exception. The issue has recently become a popular talking point on both the far-left and the far-right, while centrists of both parties are pushed to the sidelines. While the far-left cries of a non-existent, Israeli-committed genocide (see Aljazeera’s…

Read More...

My Hillel Neglects Queer Jews

By Noah Strauss February 21, 2017

I came out to myself, and my wider community, during my sophomore year of college. Hillel was the first organization I was involved in on campus, and before I ever entered queer spaces, I came out at my Hillel. The reactions made me reflect on Hillel’s relationship with queer Jews and gave me with a…

Read More...

Tu B’Shvat Thoughts: Bringing Mysticism Back

By Hannah Weintraub February 16, 2017

When Tu B’shvat comes around, I roll up my sleeves and prepare myself for the ritual tree planting, garden weeding, and litter collecting that has marked my Tu B’shvats of the past. My less observant, modern Jewish community taught me the holiday’s message of social justice in concrete terms: We plant trees, trees grow, trees…

Read More...

JOFA Conference Explores Orthodox Feminism on Campus

By Sara Weissman and Hannah Weintraub February 16, 2017

“…the Rabbinic Panel has made clear that women serving in clergy roles or holding clergy titles is at odds with halacha…” read a statement by the Orthodox Union on women’s ordination. This month’s controversial OU ban on female clergy roles came on the heels of an Orthodox event advocating just the opposite – JOFA 2017. The…

Read More...

Why We Marched on Washington as Reform Jews

By Taylor Gleeson and Jeremy Cronig February 14, 2017

We attend university in Columbus, Ohio, but watching the anticipation for the Women’s March build in our nation’s capital, we knew that this was not a moment in history when we could stand aside and simply watch. Our generation of college students are going to come of age in this era of renewed divisiveness. Soon…

Read More...

Jewish Schools, Stop the Statements on Policy

By Jackson Richman February 10, 2017

Although President Donald Trump’s temporary immigration ban has been halted by a federal court in Washington state, Jewish educational institutions shouldn’t be publicly sitting in judgment on issues that do not pertain to the Jewish community or Israel. At the expense of possibly furthering division in the Jewish community, it is best for such institutions…

Read More...

Jews and the Muslim Ban – This Time, It’s Personal

By Marc Daalder February 9, 2017

When my great-grandfather left England around the turn of the century, in part due to anti-Semitism, his name was Harris Moses. By the time he set foot on U.S. soil, it had changed to the much more goyishe Julius Harris. Of course, he was not the only immigrant Jew to change his name to better…

Read More...

This Jewish “Well-Behaved Woman” Marches

By Hannah Caspar-Johnson February 8, 2017

“Well-behaved women seldom make history.” So read my sign, after several hours of dorm room crafting, not to mention the days of agonizing over what to write for the Women’s March on Washington. My roommate was the first to comment on the irony of my chosen slogan, pointing out that I’m actually a fairly well-behaved…

Read More...

UC Berkeley Students React to Violence at Milo Yiannopoulos Protest

By Sara Weissman February 3, 2017

On the night of Feb. 1, violence erupted at a UC Berkeley protest in opposition to controversial conservative speaker and Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos. Yiannopoulos, who had been invited to speak by the Berkeley College Republicans, evacuated the premises and his speaking engagement was cancelled at 5:45 p.m. According to The Daily Californian, what started as a…

Read More...

“Refusing to Choose” Forum Highlights Orthodox LGBTQ Activists

By Michele Amira February 2, 2017

In the Talmud it says, “Whomever saves a life, it is as if they have saved the entire world.”  Yet many observant queer Jews are struggling in the closet and suffer high rates of suicide. According to Hannah Bar-Yosef, a member of the Israeli Interministerial Committee for Suicide (operated under the auspices of the Health…

Read More...